AtmanIsBrahman

Moving on to Part 2, the book is getting a lot better though.

I’ve been reading this book too. So far I have to say I’m not that impressed. There are many points where Ralston sounds like a materialist scientist, who doesn’t know science very well. The words “physical” and “objective” are used a lot. For example: “All perception, thought, and experience is indirect. This is just saying the perceptive-experience you have of something is not the same as the thing-itself.” “sight is a function of light bouncing off an object and you interpreting the light. This means the “data” gathered by the light stimulating nerves in the eye are funneled through interpretation and association to make sense of it.” But this could also be an issue of how language is used…

It’s a tricky dilemma, because if he watched many years ago, he may be after more basic self-help stuff. Maybe this one? Or some practical video along those lines.

WARNING: THIS IS SUBJECTIVE! I thought I would make a thread posting my favorite videos, but then I realized it would be much more useful for myself and others to make a sort of encyclopedia of actualized.org videos. The point is as follows: 1) To give newbies or people who haven’t watched everything a sense of where to focus 2) To highlight videos that I think might be underappreciated 3) Just for shits and gigs This “encyclopedia” has some biases. Mainly, it is subjective (everyone will have their unique preferences of videos). Also, it is focused on the truth-seeking, mystical, philosophical side of this work, so self help might be underrepresented… but that’s because the existential stuff is where the real juice lies. So here we go. Best Starting Point This is where I started, and it left me stunned. Although it’s not technically an actualized.org video, these interviews give you a solid sense of Leo’s “worldview,” at least as much as you will get without watching for hundreds of hours and contemplating yourself. That’s why this is the best starting place. Of course, this doesn’t give you much insight on personal development stuff, but I already stated that the list would not be focused on that domain. Foundational For these, I don’t have a particular order in mind; I just recommend to watch all of them. This should be done after the Curt Jaimungal interview. Obviously there are other foundational episodes, but I consider these to be most foundational. This clip is very profound and foundational: This your intro to actualized.org. You're welcome. There is much more of course, but this is probably the best, most condensed starting point. The Spirit of The Work Peter Ralston also uses this phrase. These videos distill the spirit of truth-seeking and self-actualization. The first one has more of a personal development angle, but still includes spirituality. The last two, which feel like they go together, are more directly about the truth-seeking process. Most Profound This next one is profound in an epistemic way Solipsism video (IYKYK) These videos are all absolutely mindblowing. Wouldn't recommend if you're mentally unstable, but otherwise they are like crack--a healthy version. Most Practical Surprisingly Good/Underrated This section might be insightful even for seasoned actualized.org veterans. When you realize society is gaslighting you out of unconsciousness... And this one is about how to be complete as God. And the most niche one here, only on the blog: https://www.actualized.org/insights/sherlock-holmes-brain This one ranks up there with Leo's best epistemology videos. Personal Favorite This video is just so profound. I suspect most people here don’t fully appreciate it. This is Leo explaining the absolute logic of Existence/God, basically everything that can be understood. You appreciate this even more if you’re familiar with the philosophical history of people making arguments for God, which all fail because they’re operating from a religious theistic understanding of God (where God is separate from the universe). Yet in this video, Leo creates proofs better than anything people have come up with in the history of thought—because the proofs are absolute. And the rant at the end is a lot of fun

How do you know this?

Okay, that's kind of what I thought. Speaking of which, you mentioned that combining rationality with mysticism is especially powerful. Do you consider them most powerful for building a worldview (if you can call it that) or for contemplating while in a high state of consciousness? Because most mystics would say that thinking is irrelevant and you have to just experience. And how does post-rationality/high stages of ego development/jailbreaking the mind play into this?

Thanks for the video Leo. I have a couple questions. The first one is more basic: What do you mean by rationality? Since advanced states of God-consciousness or alien consciousness are still rational, it obviously refers to something different than the normal sense of the word. I understand it as using your mind well- is that in the right ballpark?

I’m so excited to start watching… The first 2 episodes I learned a ridiculous amount

Did they say they were over 120? How do you know they were telling the truth? How do you know that these concepts of energy and vibration affecting aging are actually real?

I think I’ve done it. It comes down to personality and caring about truth.

You can do it yourself, if you are willing. And then you can even go beyond that stage. That’s what I’ve done with actualized.org.

Fair enough, I just think studying science in university is a very arbitrary standard to have. For example: if someone studies math, they do learn some amount of rationality as it applies to math—but whether they can apply that outside the limited context of math, or even go beyond it, is another question. It’s the same thing for fields like biology, physics, etc. They all use some rationality, but it’s applied very narrowly.

@Leo Gura Why is it that studying science in university is the criterium for having rationality? I don’t think you understand that most people doing science in university are just conformist NPCs doing it because everyone else is. Why isn’t studying philosophy a better criterium for rationality—that’s what you did. I’m aware of all the problems with academic philosophy, but it’s still better than science. Every scientific field is siloed and lacks holism (every academic field really). It has nothing to do with actually understanding reality on a deep level. If you ask any person studying science about their epistemology, they will reveal themselves to be clowns.

This post is an uncomfortable truth bomb. But here goes—- There’s a disturbing truth about spiritual teachings: the teaching always has to attract people to it somehow in order to survive. And this attraction will always be corrupt. Every spiritual teacher has to offer “goodies” to people in order to continue its survival. They have to do this because almost no one cares about truth, so they have to be brought into the spiritual practice by some corrupt motive. The only way they could not have to do this is if people in general cared about truth, but that’s too much of a burden for people to take on (at least at our current level of development as a species). For example, the classic is stopping suffering. This is the juiciest goodie of all that gets the ego salivating. Why does Buddhism sell the ending of suffering? Because it gets followers. You’re not going to get followers speaking pure truth— It will either be demonized or no one will care. Now let’s look at some real-world case studies. Peter Ralston is a great spiritual teacher who actually cares about truth, but notice… what does he sell? Workshops, books, online courses. And what are these about? Absolute truth? No— they’re mostly about improving your life, ending suffering, experiencing authentically, and that kind of stuff. I’m not saying it’s bad, but that’s not pure truth. No one is teaching pure truth. And this is nothing against Peter Ralston (obviously he does care about truth), it’s just how it goes. Thinking about the implications of this… of course it applies to actualized.org. What does actualized.org sell? Yes, there is the metaphysical and spiritual stuff, but a lot of the content is Improving your life (personal development), improving your career, getting girls, etc. Also, notice that Leo’s most viewed content is the low-consciousness stuff related to personal development. It has nothing to do with truth. Creating the foundation of followers from the self-improvement stuff—luring in mouse with the cheese— allowed Leo to create actual truthful content. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be possible because no one would watch it and survival wouldn’t be possible. So, this raises the question: what is the most truthful teaching? It’s when you just say the truth to the best of your ability without any disclaimers, offering of goodies, conceptual complication, or anything like that. Leo’s solipsism video is a great example of such a teaching— but it got taken down. Why? Because it has no conceptual complication, there are no goodies (in fact it’s likely to negatively affect your life). There are disclaimers, but strictly speaking a purely truthful teaching wouldn’t include them. Basically, the teaching is bad PR. The conclusion: a pure teaching is possible but it does nothing for you and is dangerous to society. @Leo Gura@UnbornTao@Davino@Natasha Tori Maru

Have to integrate stage red- it's spiritual work

Hip hop is the highest consciousness music

That's just my username. My point still stands

@Cred Leo is right. You should listen to him. You’re trying to fit things to your beliefs rather than genuinely looking into what’s true. It’s like when a Christian takes for granted their beliefs about Jesus and then sees the world through that lens. But they never would have gotten their Christian beliefs through genuine inquiry; they were indoctrinated into them. Would you have derived all these ideas about ND/ADHD if you had never heard of those terms?

The recent blog post about sublimation of survival was interesting. A couple questions: Is going to a party always survival? If you're going just for pure enjoyment and flow state, is that still carefully concealed survival? Similarly, I agree that you'll have to do some amount of survival in life if you want to survive. But does every individual thing you do have to be survival? For example, things like playing a video game, playing an instrument, dancing, meditating, or contemplating. Or maybe it's more the intent behind the activity that matters? @Leo Gura

Probably this guy

Not true because that would bloat his face, reducing attractiveness. He claims to have taken hgH during puberty to increase his height. As for the face, the structure is impacted by using testosterone and whatever else he was injecting himself with. We don't know what Clavicular would have looked like without looksmaxxing, but I think it would have been much worse. Genetics might only be 50% of the reason for his looks. Looksmaxxing is in its infancy, but it already works to some extent. The question is what to do with it-- whether to pursue better looks or focus on more important things in life.

About the Clavicular post— I’m not sure I agree that Clavicular got his looks from genetics. They play a part, but he actually did a lot of procedures including taking steroids during puberty, which can have a real effect. Obviously he’s not a highly conscious person, but I think he represents an interesting cultural moment more so than a horrible grifter. If you watch his podcasts, it’s obvious that he’s actually fairly intelligent and reasonable in his views. For example, this is one podcast.

Sadhguru will teach you that you don't need to slay club hoes The ultimate self-help is realizing you don't need self-help

I've been reading the discussion, and I think one important question is, What is understanding? There has to be some way that awakening, enlightenment, or becoming conscious of truth is happening @UnbornTao Is understanding an experience or not? Maybe what you mean by experience is anything that is not the absolute, but that still leaves some questions open: Are you actually conscious of the absolute? What is the difference between an experience and understanding? Since understanding is always something you experience, how is it not an experience?

All you need for self-help is Sadhguru. Seriously. No need for stage orange grifters.